Harlee Holmes, 8, on the right, is helping her 3-year-old brother Creek put on his shoes while the family packs their bags to leave their home, which was damaged by a severe flood in Fromberg, Mt. , Friday. (David Goldman, Associated Press)
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FROMBERG, Mont. – While authorities are struggling to reopen Yellowstone National Park to tourists after record floods hit southern Montana, some of those most affected by the disaster live far from the hotspots of the famous park and rely heavily on each other for get your life out of the mud.
In and around the Fromberg farming community, the Clarks Fork River flooded nearly 100 homes and severely damaged a large irrigation canal that serves many farms. The mayor of the city says about a third of the flooded houses are too far away to be repaired.
Not far from the river bank, Lindi O’Brien’s trailer home was raised high enough to prevent major damage. But he took water from his barns and sheds, lost some of his poultry, and saw his recently dead parents’ house surrounded by a few feet of water.
Elected officials who came forward to go through the damage in Red Lodge and Gardiner, Montana’s tourist towns that serve as gateways to Yellowstone, have not come to Fromberg to see its devastation. O’Brien said the lack of attention is not a surprise given the city’s location away from major tourist routes.
She said she is not resentful, but that she is resigned to the idea that if Fromberg recovers, its approximately 400 residents will have to do much of the work themselves.
“We take care of each other,” O’Brien said as she and two longtime friends, Melody Murter and Aileen Rogers, combed the clay objects scattered around her property. O’Brien, an art teacher at the local school, had been fixing up her parents’ house in hopes of turning it into a vacation rental. Now she’s not sure she’s recoverable.
“When you get tired and poop, it’s okay to stop,” O’Brien told Murter and Rogers, whose clothes, hands and faces were smeared with mud.
Yellowstone will partially reopen at 8 a.m. Wednesday, more than a week after more than 10,000 visitors were forced out of the park as the Yellowstone and other rivers passed through its banks after being inflated by the meltdown. of snow and several inches of rain.
But the northern half of the country’s oldest national park, which is celebrating its 150th anniversary this year, is expected to remain closed during the summer, if not longer, along with one of the park’s main entrances through Montana. . The closure will deprive visitors of seeing Tower Fall and Lamar Valley, one of the best places in the world to see wolves and grizzly bears.
Meanwhile, outside the settlements bordering the park, there is a maze of damaged roads. A key bridge leading to the town of Fishtail collapsed and caused traffic to be diverted along a one-lane county road. There are about 500 people in Fishtail.
Lee Johnson and his wife and daughter run the MontAsia restaurant, so named because it is a fusion of Malaysian and Montana cuisine. He said the business has plummeted.
“When we first opened after the flood, it just started. And I’m starting to get that scary feeling. I’ve done all this, I’ve sunk all this money, I’ve started this business and people? You can’t get here anymore. ? ” Johnson said.
Johnson and his Malaysian wife Yokie took over the lease of a landmark 124-year-old Fishtail building earlier this year, relocating their restaurant from another part of the state. For Yokie, business was a dream come true.
“Not being from Montana, I wanted to have something,” he said. Going into business with his family was his main goal. Yokie said running the restaurant gives him strength while battling cancer.
“I don’t know how much time I have left, so the time I have left I want to be with my family, work with them every day, see them every day,” he said.
Johnson said he is humble for the opportunity to support his wife and is determined to keep the restaurant open while flood damage is repaired.
“Stick your wagon to this community and it’s just a matter of keeping up to date,” he said.
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